“Smart” devices (i.e., everyday objects configured to provide some degree of computing intelligence) are becoming more prevalent in households and in public places. Some smart devices may be located in public places (e.g., restaurants, shopping malls, hotels) and may be used by many different users in a given day or week. Typically, the process of pairing a smart device to a user's personal computing device or logging on to a smart device requires the user to perform a multistep process, such as a manual challenge-response procedure. However, due to the nature of interaction with public smart devices, a user may only use a particular public smart device once, making it unlikely that a user will go through an involved configuration process to use the public smart device. Moreover, many small smart devices may lack input mechanisms that would enable a user to log on to the smart device or pair the smart device with the user's personal computing device.